Dictionary

reduce

Etymology

From Middle English reducen, from Old French reduire, from Latin redūcō; from re- ("back") + dūcō ("lead").

Pronunciation

(RP) IPA: /ɹɪˈdjuːs/, /ɹɪˈd͡ʒuːs/
(America, Canada) IPA: /ɹɪˈd(j)us/

Verb

reduce (reduces, present participle reducing; simple past and past participle reduced)

(transitive) To bring down the size, quantity, quality, value or intensity of something; to diminish, to lower.
to reduce weight, speed, heat, expenses, price, personnel etc.
(intransitive) To lose weight.
(transitive) To bring to an inferior rank; to degrade, to demote.
to reduce a sergeant to the ranks
- 1815 February 23, [Walter Scott], Guy Mannering; or, The Astrologer. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and Archibald Constable and Co., […], →OCLC ↗:
  My father, the eldest son of an ancient but reduced family, left me with little.
- 1671, John Tillotson, “Sermon II. The Folly of Scoffing at Religion. 2 Pet[er] III. 3.”, in The Works of the Most Reverend Dr. John Tillotson, Late Lord Archbishop of Canterbury: […], 8th edition, London: […] T. Goodwin, B[enjamin] Tooke, and J. Pemberton, […]; J. Round […], and J[acob] Tonson] […], published 1720, →OCLC ↗:
  nothing so excellent but a man may falten upon something or other belonging to it whereby to reduce it .
- ^{The template does not use the parameter(s): reduced their foe to misery beneath their fears./> Please see for help with this warning.}
  1671, John Milton, “Samson Agonistes, […]”, in Paradise Regain'd. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: […] J[ohn] M[acock] for John Starkey […], →OCLC ↗:
  Having reduced their foe to misery beneath their fears.
- 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 13, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, →OCLC ↗:
  Hester Prynne was shocked at the condition to which she found the clergyman reduced.
- 1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill.: Field Museum of Natural History, →ISBN, page viii:
  Neither [Jones] […] nor I (in 1966) could conceive of reducing our "science" to the ultimate absurdity of reading Finnish newspapers almost a century and a half old in order to establish "priority."
(transitive) To humble; to conquer; to subdue; to capture.
to reduce a province or a fort
(transitive) To bring to an inferior state or condition.
to reduce a city to ashes
(transitive, cooking) To decrease the liquid content of food by boiling much of its water off.
- 2011, Edward Behr, James MacGuire, The Art of Eating Cookbook: Essential Recipes from the First 25 Years.:
  Serve the oxtails with mustard or a sauce made by reducing the soup, if any is left, to a slightly thick sauce.
(transitive, chemistry) To add electrons / hydrogen or to remove oxygen.
Formaldehyde can be reduced to form methanol.
(transitive, metallurgy) To produce metal from ore by removing nonmetallic elements in a smelter.
(transitive, mathematics) To simplify an equation or formula without changing its value.
(transitive, computer science) To express the solution of a problem in terms of another (known) algorithm.
(transitive, logic) To convert a syllogism to a clearer or simpler form.
(transitive, legal) To convert to written form. (Usage note: this verb almost always appears as "reduce to writing".)
It is important that all business contracts be reduced to writing.
(transitive, medicine) To perform a reduction; to restore a fracture or dislocation to the correct alignment.
(transitive, military) To reform a line or column from (a square).
(transitive, military) To strike off the payroll.
(transitive, Scots law) To annul by legal means.
(transitive, obsolete) To translate (a book, document, etc.).
a book reduced into English